The American Future, A History

He usually comes during an election year so he can observe the spectacle of the campaign and peer into the nation’s exposed soul. He visits the stationsof officially prescribed American exotica. He will enjoya moment of soulful rapture at a black church. He will venture out to an evangelical megachurch (and combine condescension with self-congratulationby bravely announcing to the world that these people are more human than you’d think). He will swing by and be brilliant in rambunctious Texas. He’ll be brilliant in the farm belt, brilliant in Las Vegas, reverential in Selma and profound in Malibu.